


if i conduct, you write

by hrleykeenr



Category: The Book of Mormon - Ambiguous Fandom, The Book of Mormon - Parker/Stone/Lopez
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Autism, Cochlear Implant, M/M, One Shot, POV Second Person, SPD, deafness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-20
Updated: 2018-09-20
Packaged: 2019-07-14 20:13:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,346
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16047731
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hrleykeenr/pseuds/hrleykeenr
Summary: the world is played in minor key with every note falling flat until you realise that you’re listening to the wrong movements./short warm-up sorta thing i wrote on the bus?





	if i conduct, you write

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thegreatwhizzermoroni](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thegreatwhizzermoroni/gifts).



> well thanks to thegreatwhizzermoroni for telling me to post this. now i can delete the note.

you’re new and it’s not really fine because you have nobody apart from the blue-eyed boy with the headphones, only you don’t really have him, you only have him in the sense that you’re both alone and it’s sort of comforting to know that the ostracism isn’t just because of your crappy personality.

 

you’re slightly less new (but still new) when your homeroom teacher reads out the announcement that gsa will be back this year since they’ve managed to find someone to run it. someone willing to sit in a room with queer kids complaining that all the attractive girls/boys are straight or not into trans kids and it’s predictable, your mind adds. that doesn’t stop you from writing down ‘thursday lunch, m24’ in the very back of your planner like it’s a sin to even think of going.

 

by the time next thursday lunch rolls around, you’ve convinced yourself you’re not going four times, and told yourself you are five times. you do end up going, only after stalling in the canteen until looking at the clock causes your breath to hitch because now you’re late and stupid.

 

you skulk into the music room, hand naturally rising to sign sorry rather than saying it. one because you’re still getting the hang of talking and your voice is still noticeable; two because your breath hitching has turned into slight hyperventilating. you sit in the closest chair and only then do you notice out of your peripheral the headphones boy watching you, rapt.

 

you turn to headphones boy after he’s been staring at you happily for four minutes and twenty-seven seconds. he grins a little wider and starts signing rapidly, probably faster than you can considering your mom hasn’t signed to you in a while and you’ve had no need to when alone.

 

headphones boy is called connor. he’s autistic and has a thing called sensory processing disorder. you’ve never actually heard of that, but he was quick to fingerspell it to clarify. it messes with his brain. he wears the headphones because he thinks sound is the worst sense and noises make him feel like he’s ‘being surrounded by out of tune pianos and symphonies all played in minor key flats’. the headphones are called ear defenders and they’re what builders wear when they operate loud machines like jackhammers, so they don’t damage their hearing. connor tells you that every noise feels like that, and he hates his ears.

 

you start to talk a little. then a lot. you tell connor that sound is one of the greatest things you’ve ever experienced. you’ve waited seventeen years for it and it’s the most beautiful thing, something you couldn’t even have imagined. you have a voice now, and you can speak, albeit kinda weird, and hum and hear yourself. you can hear your mom calling your brother to get up in the mornings, and the keurig boiling away the second pot of coffee (which is exclusively yours), and your little sister giggling and it’s fucking beautiful. you hear music in every noise. to you, every single sound is a symphony, unique and special. there are so many things you haven’t even heard yet! you had your first disney musical marathon and you finally understand why people go wild for frozen and moana and the little mermaid.

 

 

connor swallows. he looks a little confused, smiling in his half-grimace, contorted way.

 

you pause for effect. but, you say with a grin, holding up a finger rather than signing. connor grins too and you love it. you hate noise a lot. there’s no more off button to go from ‘vague collection of fuzzy noises’ to silence. it’s so excruciating sometimes that you don’t know how hearing people do it. you’ve gone to bed early sometimes just to force your head under the quilts and pillows and bask in the cotton-wooly, underwater feeling. on your second day here, there was a fire alarm. you froze in place and they couldn’t get you to move, because all that you could think of was what the ever-loving fuck is that? when your teacher took your hands off of your ears and wrenched you out the fire doors, you started crying and your mom was called to come take you home. your dad drove while you lay curled up in the backseat, your head in your mom’s lap as she hugged you and protected your ears.

 

connor has this look on his face like he’s seen a whole new world.

 

so, he starts to speak. it’s your turn to have that enamored look on your face.

 

that’s the best voice i’ve ever heard, you tell him.

 

he pauses, blushes, and continues to tell you his favorite sounds. they’re all similar, but the way he speaks of them makes you write them on your hand, biro dragging across your skin sloppily as you listen to him.

 

turns out that connor is quite the classical music fan. he told you he liked musicals, but they’re just so ‘bravado-y’ according to him, and he can’t do that at school. he plays the double bass, which, again in his words, is a ‘fat fucking violin’. he gives you explicit instructions as to which pieces fit which mood. the teacher finally finishes talking and somehow you’ve survived without being caught talking amongst yourselves.

 

you take a cookie from the tray and offer to share with connor since they’re pretty big. connor doesn’t accept but that’s okay because you’re pretty sure you love him right now, and you’d probably do something stupid like volunteer to go to mars forever if it meant he’d like you. halfway through lunch, he gets a little worked up maybe, and storms out. you move to follow him but someone kicks your chair in warning. you don’t go. the noise becomes a cacophony without him there as your conductor.

 

at the end of the school day, you spend ten extra minutes waiting outside to try and intercept him. people pass by and some look at you strangely, but it’s really fine. you’re bouncing on your toes, eagerly awaiting his arrival with bated breath. finally, at eighteen minutes to three, connor walks out, ginger hair dishevelled and matted around the band of his ear defenders. even with them on, he has his hands over his ears to press them closer. you head over to him enthusiastically and grab at your backpack straps while signing hello quickly. he steps around you and looks pretty uncomfortable, but nods.

 

you try again, walking backwards and asking if he’s okay. you hope he’s okay. connor stops and grabs your hand, huffing as he pulls you to the side and starts on a rant.

 

you come to learn that connor gets uncomfortable whenever they share their sexualities at the start of the year in gsa because he went to conversion therapy and it’s taken him a long time to be able to even think about liking boys. he’s gay but hasn’t said it aloud. you nod briefly and look down to find blood on his nails and scratch marks on his hands. you tell him it’s not good and he tries to start again, so obviously you take his hands. hopefully your skin is a ‘good feel’ for him.

 

connor laughs a little. you’re not too sure at what, but his laugh is even more beautiful than his voice. he takes his headphones off and places them on your head with a gentle pat.

 

then he’s kissing you and all the drowning underwater feelings stop and you’re clasping his hands because this is your first kiss and the stories about fireworks are true. it’s the feeling of going to a live music performance and getting chills when the orchestra start to tune before the first piece. it’s love, you’re pretty sure.

 

you finally break away. connor’s writing on your hand in pink gel pen and then he’s gone. you don’t dare to look at it until you’re home in your room, door locked.

 

_i’d like to write a symphony with you._

**Author's Note:**

> should i,,, post things i write randomly more often? comment anything honestly.


End file.
